The Secret of the Night by Gaston Leroux

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In the front line of the crowd that waited to see Annouchka comeout he recognized Natacha, with her head enveloped in the blackmantle so that none should see her face. Besides, this corner ofthe garden was in a half-gloom. The police barred the way; he couldnot approach as near Natacha as he wished. He set himself to sliplike a serpent through the crowd. He was not separated from Natachaby more than four or five persons when a great jostling commenced.Annouchka was coming out. Cries rose: "Annouchka! Annouchka!"Rouletabille threw himself on his knees and on all-fours succeededin sticking his head through into the way kept by the police forAnnouchka's passage. There, wrapped in a great red mantle, his haton his arm, was a man Rouletabille immediately recognized. It wasPrince Galitch. They were hurrying to escape the impending pressureof the crowd. But Annouchka as she passed near Natacha stopped justa second - a movement that did not escape Rouletabille - and,turning toward her said just the one word, "Caracho." Then shepassed on. Rouletabille got up and forced his way back, havingonce more lost Natacha. He searched for her. He ran to thecarriage-way and arrived just in time to see her seated in acarriage with the Mourazoff family. The carriage started at oncein the direction of the datcha des Iles. The young man remainedstanding there, thinking. He made a gesture as though he wereready now to let luck take its course. "In the end," said he, "itwill be better so, perhaps," and then, to himself, "Now to supper,my boy."

He turned in his tracks and soon was established in the glaringlight of the restaurant. Officers standing, glass in hand, weresaluting from table to table and waving a thousand compliments withgrace that was almost feminine.

He heard his name called joyously, and recognized the voice of IvanPetrovitch. The three boon companions were seated over a bottle ofchampagne resting in its ice-bath and were being served with tinypates while they waited for the supper-hour, which was now near.

Rouletabille yielded to their invitation readily enough, andaccompanied them when the head-waiter informed Thaddeus that thegentlemen were desired in a private room. They went to the firstfloor and were ushered into a large apartment whose balcony openedon the hall of the winter-theater, empty now. But the apartmentwas already occupied. Before a table covered with a shining serviceGounsovski did the honors.

He received them like a servant, with his head down, an obsequioussmile, and his back bent, bowing several times as each of the guestswere presented to him. Athanase had described him accuratelyenough, a mannikin in fat. Under the vast bent brow one couldhardly see his eyes, behind the blue glasses that seemed alwaysready to fall as he inclined too far his fat head with its timidand yet all-powerful glance. When he spoke in his falsetto voice,his chin dropped in a fold over his collar, and he had a steadygesture with the thumb and index finger of his right hand to retainthe glasses from sliding down his short, thick nose.

Behind him there was the fine, haughty silhouette of Prince Galitch.He had been invited by Annouchka, for she had consented to risk thissupper only in company with three or four of her friends, officerswho could not be further compromised by this affair, as they werealready under the eye of the Okrana (Secret Police) despite theirhigh birth. Gounsovski had seen them come with a sinister chuckleand had lavished upon them his marks of devotion.

He loved Annouchka. It would have sufficed to have surprised justonce the jealous glance he sent from beneath his great blue glasseswhen he gazed at the singer to have understood the sentiments thatactuated him in the presence of the beautiful daughter of the BlackLand.

Annouchka was seated, or, rather, she lounged, Oriental fashion,on the sofa which ran along the wall behind the table. She paidattention to no one. Her attitude was forbidding, even hostile.She indifferently allowed her marvelous black hair that fell in twotresses over her shoulder to be caressed by the perfumed hands ofthe beautiful Onoto, who had heard her this evening for the firsttime and had thrown herself with enthusiasm into her arms after thelast number. Onoto was an artist too, and the pique she felt atfirst over Annouchka's success could not last after the emotionaroused by the evening prayer before the hut. "Come to supper,"Annouchka had said to her.

"With whom?" inquired the Spanish artist.

"With Gounsovski."

"Never."

"Do come. You will help me pay my debt and perhaps he will beuseful to you as well. He is useful to everybody."

Decidedly Onoto did not understand this country, where the worstenemies supped together.

Rouletabille had been monopolized at once by Prince Galitch, whotook him into a corner and said:

"What are you doing here?"

"Do I inconvenience you?" asked the boy.

The other assumed the amused smile of the great lord.

"While there is still time," he said, "believe me, you ought tostart, to quit this country. Haven't you had sufficient notice?"

"Yes," replied the reporter. "And you can dispense with any furthernotice from this time on."

He turned his back.

"Why, it is the little Frenchman from the Trebassof villa," commencedthe falsetto voice of Gounsovski as he pushed a seat towards theyoung man and begged him to sit between him and Athanase Georgevitch,who was already busy with the hors-doeuvres.

"How do you do, monsieur?" said the beautiful, grave voice of Annouchka.

Rouletabille saluted.

"I see that I am in a country of acquaintances," he said, withoutappearing disturbed.

He addressed a lively compliment to Annouchka, who threw him a kiss.

"Rouletabille!" cried la belle Onoto. "Why, then, he is the littlefellow who solved the mystery of the Yellow Room."

"Himself."

"What are you doing here?"

"He came to save the life of General Trebassof," sniggeredGounsovski. "He is certainly a brave little young man."

"The police know everything," said Rouletabille coldly. And heasked for champagne, which he never drank.

The champagne commenced its work. While Thaddeus and the officerstold each other stories of Bakou or paid compliments to the women,Gounsovski, who was through with raillery, leaned toward Rouletabilleand gave that young man fatherly counsel with great unction.

"You have undertaken, young man, a noble task and one all the moredifficult because General Trebassof is condemned not only by hisenemies but still more by the ignorance of Koupriane. Understandme thoroughly: Koupriane is my friend and a man whom I esteem veryhighly. He is good, brave as a warrior, but I wouldn't give akopeck for his police. He has mixed in our affairs lately bycreating his own secret police, but I don't wish to meddle with that.It amuses us. It's the new style, anyway; everybody wants his secretpolice nowadays. And yourself, young man, what, after all, are youdoing here? Reporting? No. Police work? That is our businessand your business. I wish you good luck, but I don't expect it.Remember that if you need any help I will give it you willingly. Ilove to be of service. And I don't wish any harm to befall you."

"You are very kind, monsieur," was all Rouletabille replied, andhe called again for champagne.

Several times Gounsovski addressed remarks to Annouchka, whoconcerned herself with her meal and had little answer for him.

"Do you know who applauded you the most this evening?"

"No," said Annouchka indifferently.

"The daughter of General Trebassof."

"Yes, that is true, on my word," cried Ivan Petrovitch.

"Yes, yes, Natacba was there," joined in the other friends from thedatcha des Iles.

"For me, I saw her weep," said Rouletabille, looking at Annouchkafixedly.

All broke out laughing. Gounsovski recovered his slipping glassesby his usual quick movement and sniggered softly, insinuatingly,like fat boiling in the pot:

"So they say. And it is my strength."

"His system is excellent," said the prince. "As he is in witheverybody, everybody is in with the police, without knowing it."

"They say ... ah, ah ... they say ..." (Athanase was choking over alittle piece of toast that he had soaked in his soup) "they say thathe has driven away all the hooligans and even all the beggars of thechurch of Kasan."

Thereupon they commenced to tell stories of the hooligans,street-thieves who since the recent political troubles had infestedSt. Petersburg and whom nobody, could get rid of without payingfor it.

Athanase Georgevitch said:

"There are hooligans that ought to have existed even if they neverhave. One of them stopped a young girl before Varsovie station.The girl, frightened, immediately held out her purse to him, withtwo roubles and fifty kopecks in it. The hooligan took it all.'Goodness,' cried she, 'I have nothing now to take my train with.''How much is it?' asked the hooligan. 'Sixty kopecks.' 'Sixtykopecks! Why didn't you say so?' And the bandit, hanging onto thetwo roules, returned the fifty-kopeck piece to the trembling childand added a ten-kopeck piece out of his own pocket."

"Something quite as funny happened to me two winters ago, at Moscow,"said la belle Onoto. "I had just stepped out of the door when I wasstopped by a hooligan. 'Give me twenty kopecks,' said the hooligan.I was so frightened that I couldn't get my purse open. 'Quicker,'said he. Finally I gave him twenty kopecks. 'Now,' said he then,'kiss my hand.' And I had to kiss it, because he held his knife inthe other."

"Oh, they are quick with their knives," said Thaddeus. "As I wasleaving Gastinidvor once I was stopped by a hooligan who stuck ahuge carving-knife under my nose. 'You can have it for a roubleand a half,' he said. You can believe that I bought it without anyhaggling. And it was a very good bargain. It was worth at leastthree roubles. Your health, belle Onoto."

"I always take my revolver when I go out," said Athanase. "It ismore prudent. I say this before the police. But I would rather bearrested by the police than stabbed by the hooligans."

"There's no place any more to buy revolvers," dedared IvanPetrovitch. "All such places are closed."

Gounsovski settled his glasses, rubbed his fat hands and said:

"There are some still at my locksmith's place. The proof is thatto-day in the little Kaniouche my locksmith, whose name is Smith,when into the house of the grocer at the corner and wished to sellhim a revolver. It was a Browning. 'An arm of the greatestreliability,' he said to him, 'which never misses fire and whichworks very easily.' Having pronounced these words, the locksmithtried his revolver and lodged a ball in the grocer's lung. Thegrocer is dead, but before he died he bought the revolver. 'Youare right,' he said to the locksmith; 'it is a terrible weapon.'And then he died."

The others laughed heartily. They thought it very funny. Decidedlythis great Gounsovski always had a funny story. Who would not liketo be his friend? Annouchka had deigned to smile. Gounsovski, inrecognition, extended his hand to her like a mendicant. The youngwoman touched it with the end of her fingers, as if she were placinga twenty-kopeck piece in the hand of a hooligan, and withdrew fromit with disgust. Then the doors opened for the Bohemians. Theirswarthy troupe soon filled the room. Every evening men and womenin their native costumes came from old Derevnia, where they livedall together in a sort of ancient patriarchal community, with customsthat had not changed for centuries; they scattered about in theplaces of pleasure, in the fashionable restaurants, where theygathered large sums, for it was a fashionable luxury to have themsing at the end of suppers, and everyone showered money on them inorder not to be behind the others. They accompanied on guzlas, oncastanets, on tambourines, and sang the old airs, doleful andlanguorous, or excitable and breathiess as the flight of theearliest nomads in the beginnings of the world.

When they had entered, those present made place for them, andRouletabille, who for some moments had been showing marks of fatigueand of a giddiness natural enough in a young man who isn't in thehabit of drinking the finest champagnes, profited by the diversionto get a corner of the sofa not far from Prince Galitch, whooccupied the place at Annouchka's right.

"Look, Rouletabaille is asleep," remarked la belle Onoto.

"Poor boy!" said Annouchka.

And, turning toward Gounsovski:

"Aren't you soon going to get him out of our way? I heard some ofour brethren the other day speaking in a way that would cause painto those who care about his health."

"Oh, that," said Gounsovski, shaking his head, "is an affair I havenothing to do with. Apply to Koupriane. Your health, belleAnnouchka."

But the Bohemians swept some opening chords for their songs, andthe singers took everybody's attention, everybody excepting PrinceGalitch and Annouchka, who, half turned toward one another,exchanged some words on the edge of all this musical uproar. Asfor Rouletabille, he certainly must have been sleeping soundly notto have been waked by all that noise, melodious as it was. It istrue that he had - apparently - drunk a good deal and, as everyoneknows, in Russia drink lays out those who can't stand it. Whenthe Bohemians had sung three times Gounsovski made a sign that theymight go to charm other ears, and slipped into the hands of thechief of the band a twenty-five rouble note. But Onoto wished togive her mite, and a regular collection commenced. Each one threwroubles into the plate held out by a little swarthy Bohemian girlwith crow-black hair, carelessly combed, falling over her forehead,her eyes and her face, in so droll a fashion that one would havesaid the little thing was a weeping-willow soaked in ink. Theplate reached Prince Galitch, who futilely searched his pockets.

"Bah!" said he, with a lordly air, "I have no money. But here ismy pocket-book; I will give it to you for a souvenir of me,Katharina."

Thaddeus and Athanase exclaimed at the generosity of the prince,but Annouchka said:

"The prince does as he should, for my friends can never sufficientlyrepay the hospitality that that little thing gave me in her dirtyhut when I was in hiding, while your famous department was decidingwhat to do about me, my dear Gounsovski."

"Eh," replied Gounsovski, "I let you know that all you had to dowas to take a fine apartment in the city."

Annouchka spat on the ground like a teamster, and Gounsovski fromyellow turned green.

"But why did you hide yourself that way, Annouchka?" asked Onoto asshe caressed the beautiful tresses of the singer.

"You know I had been condemned to death, and then pardoned. I hadbeen able to leave Moscow, and I hadn't any desire to be re-takenhere and sent to taste the joys of Siberia."

"But why were you condemned to death?"

"Why, she doesn't know anything!" exclaimed the others.

"Good Lord, I'm just back from London and Paris - how should I knowanything! But to have been condemned to death! That must havebeen amusing."

"Very amusing," said Annouchka icily. "And if you have a brotherwhom you love, Onoto, think how much more amusing it must be tohave him shot before you."

"Oh, my love, forgive me!"

"So you may know and not give any pain to your Annouchka in thefuture, I will tell you, madame, what happened to our dear friend,"said Prince Galitch.

"We would do better to drive away such terrible memories," venturedGounsovski, lifting his eyelashes behind his glasses, but he benthis head as Annouchka sent him a blazing glance.

"Speak, Galitch."

The Prince did as she said.

"Annouchka had a brother, Vlassof, an engineer on the Kasan line,whom the Strike Committee had ordered to take out a train as theonly means of escape for the leaders of the revolutionary troopswhen Trebassof's soldiers, aided by the Semenowsky regiment, hadbecome masters of the city. The last resistance took place at thestation. It was necessary to get started. All the ways wereguarded by the military. There were soldiers everywhere! Vlassofsaid to his comrades, 'I will save you;' and his comrades saw himmount the engine with a woman. That woman was - well, there shesits. Vlassof's fireman had been killed the evening before, on abarricade; it was Annouchka who took his place. They busiedthemselves and the train started like a shot. On that curved line,discovered at once, easy to attack, under a shower of bullets,Vlassof developed a speed of ninety versts an hour. He ran theindicator up to the explosion point. The lady over there continuedto pile coal into the furnace. The danger came to be less from themilitary and more from an explosion at any moment. In the midst ofthe balls Vlassof kept his usual coolness. He sped not only withthe firebox open but with the forced draught. It was a miraclethat the engine was not smashed against the curve of the embankment.But they got past. Not a man was hurt. Only a woman was wounded.She got a ball in the chest."

"There!" cried Annouchka.

With a magnificent gesture she flung open her white and heavingchest, and put her finger on a scar that Gounsovski, whose fat beganto melt in heavy drops of sweat about his temples, dared not look at.

"Fifteen days later," continued the prince, "Vlassof entered an innat Lubetszy. He didn't know it was full of soldiers. His facenever altered. They searched him. They found a revolver and paperson him. They knew whom they had to do with. He was a good prize.Vlassof was taken to Moscow and condemned to be shot. His sister,wounded as she was, learned of his arrest and joined him. 'I donot wish,' she said to him, 'to leave you to die alone.' She alsowas condemned. Before the execution the soldiers offered to bandagetheir eyes, but both refused, saying they preferred to meet deathface to face. The orders were to shoot all the other condemnedrevolutionaries first, then Vlassof, then his sister. It was invain that Vlassof asked to die last. Their comrades in executionsank to their knees, bleeding from their death wounds. Vlassofembraced his sister and walked to the place of death. There headdressed the soldiers: 'Now you have to carry out your dutyaccording to the oath you have taken. Fulfill it honestly as Ihave fulfilled mine. Captain, give the order.' The volleysounded. Vlassof remained erect, his arms crossed on his breast,safe and sound. Not a ball had touched him. The soldiers did notwish to fire at him. He had to summon them again to fulfill theirduty, and obey their chief. Then they fired again, and he fell.He looked at his sister with his eyes full of horrible suffering.Seeing that he lived, and wishing to appear charitable, the captain,upon Annouchka's prayers, approached and cut short his sufferingsby firing a revolver into his ear. Now it was Annouchka's turn.She knelt by the body of her brother, kissed his bloody lips, roseand said, 'I am ready.' As the guns were raised, an officer camerunning, bearing the pardon of the Tsar. She did not wish it, andshe whom they had not bound when she was to die had to be restrainedwhen she learned she was to live."

Prince Galitch, amid the anguished silence of all there, started toadd some words of comment to his sinister recital, but Annouchkainterrupted:

"The story is ended," said she. "Not a word, Prince. If I askedyou to tell it in all its horror, if I wished you to bring back tous the atrocious moment of my brother's death, it is so thatmonsieur" (her fingers pointed to Gounsovski) "shall know well,once for all, that if I have submitted for some hours now to thispromiscuous company that has been imposed upon me, now that I havepaid the debt by accepting this abominable supper, I have nothingmore to do with this purveyor of bagnios and of hangman's ropes whois here."

"She is mad," he muttered. "She is mad. What has come over her?What has happened? Only to-day she was so, so amiable."

And he stuttered, desolately, with an embarrassed laugh:

"Ah, the women, the women! Now what have I done to her?"

"What have you done to me, wretch? Where are Belachof, Bartowskyand Strassof? And Pierre Slutch? All the comrades who swore withme to revenge my brother? Where are they? On what gallows did youhave them hung? What mine have you buried them in? And still youfollow your slavish task. And my friends, my other friends, thepoor comrades of my artist life, the inoffensive young men who havenot committed any other crime than to come to see me too often whenI was lively, and who believed they could talk freely in mydressing-room - where are they? Why have they left me, one by one?Why have they disappeared? It is you, wretch, who watched them,who spied on them, making me, I haven't any doubt, your horribleaccomplice, mixing me up in your beastly work, you dog! You knewwhat they call me. You have known it for a long time, and you maywell laugh over it. But I, I never knew until this evening; Inever learned until this evening all I owe to you. 'Stool pigeon!Stool pigeon!' I! Horror! Ah, you dog, you dog! Your mother,when you were brought into the world, your mother ..." Here shehurled at him the most offensive insult that a Russian can offer aman of that race.

She trembled and sobbed with rage, spat in fury, and stood up readyto go, wrapped in her mantle like a great red flag. She was thestatue of hate and vengeance. She was horrible and terrible. Shewas beautiful. At the final supreme insult, Gounsovski startedand rose to his feet as though he had received an actual blow inthe face. He did not look at Annouchka, but fixed his eyes onPrince Galitch. His finger pointed him out:

"There is the man," he hissed, "who has told you all these finethings."

"I know that monsieur has many friends at court," agreed the chiefof the Secret Service with an ominous calm. "I 'don't wish ill tomonsieur. You speak, madame, of the way some of your friends havehad to be sacrificed. I hope that some day you will be betterinformed, and that you will understand I saved all of them I could."

"Let us go," muttered Annouchka. "I shall spit in his face."

"Yes, all I could," replied the other, with his habitual gesture ofhanging on to his glasses. "And I shall continue to do so. Ipromise you not to say anything more disagreeable to the princethan as regards his little friend the Bohemian Katharina, whom hehas treated so generously just now, doubtless because BorisMourazoff pays her too little for the errands she runs each morningto the villa of Krestowsky Ostrow."

At these words the Prince and Annouchka both changed countenance.Their anger rose. Annouchka turned her head as though to arrangethe folds of her cloak. Galitch contented himself with shrugginghis shoulders impatiently and murmuring:

"Still some other abomination that you are concocting, monsieur,and that we don't know how to reply to."

After which he bowed to the supper-party, took Annouchka's arm andhad her move before him. Gounsovski bowed, almost bent in two.When he rose he saw before him the three astounded and horrifiedfigures of Thaddeus Tchitchnikoff, Ivan Petrovitch and AthanaseGeorgevitch.

"Messieurs," he said to them, in a colorless voice which seemed notto belong to him, "the time has come for us to part. I need notsay that we have supped as friends and that, if you wish it to beso, we can forget everything that has been said here."

The three others, frightened, at once protested their discretion.He added, roughly this time, "Service of the Tsar," and the threestammered, "God save the Tsar!" After which he saw them to thedoor. When the door had closed after them, he said, "My littleAnnouchka, you mustn't reckon without me." He hurried toward thesofa, where Rouletabille was lying forgotten, and gave him a tapon the shoulder.

"Come, get up. Don't act as though you were asleep. Not an instantto lose. They are going to carry through the Trebassof affair thisevening."

Rouletabille was already on his legs.

"Oh, monsieur," said he, "I didn't want you to tell me that. Thanksall the same, and good evening."

He went out.

Gounsovski rang. A servant appeared.

"Tell them they may now open all the rooms on this corridor; I'llnot hold them any longer." Thus had Gounsovski kept himselfprotected.

Left alone, the head of the Secret Service wiped his brow and dranka great glass of iced water which he emptied at a draught. Then hesaid:

"Koupriane will have his work cut out for him this evening; I wishhim good luck. As to them, whatever happens, I wash my hands ofthem."

And he rubbed his hands.

X

A DRAMA IN THE NIGHT

At the door of the Krestowsky Rouletabille, who was in a hurry fora conveyance, jumped into an open carriage where la belle Onoto wasalready seated. The dancer caught him on her knees.

"To Eliaguine, fast as you can," cried the reporter for allexplanation.

"Scan! Scan! (Quickly, quickly)" repeated Onoto.

She was accompanied by a vague sort of person to whom neither ofthem paid the least attention.

"What a supper! You waked up at last, did you?" quizzed the actress.But Rouletabille, standing up behind the enormous coachman, urgedthe horses and directed the route of the carriage. They boltedalong through the night at a dizzy pace. At the corner of a bridgehe ordered the horses stopped, thanked his companions anddisappeared.

"What a country! What a country! Caramba!" said the Spanish artist.

The carriage waited a few minutes, then turned back toward the city.

Rouletabille got down the embankment and slowly, taking infiniteprecautions not to reveal his presence by making the least noise,made his way to where the river is widest. Seen through theblackness of the night the blacker mass of the Trebassof villaloomed like an enormous blot, he stopped. Then he glided like asnake through the reeds, the grass, the ferns. He was at the backof the villa, near the river, not far from the little path wherehe had discovered the passage of the assassin, thanks to the brokencobwebs. At that moment the moon rose and the birch-trees, whichjust before had been like great black staffs, now became whitetapers which seemed to brighten that sinister solitude.

The reporter wished to profit at once by the sudden luminance tolearn if his movements had been noticed and if the approaches tothe villa on that side were guarded. He picked up a small pebbleand threw it some distance from him along the path. At theunexpected noise three or four shadowy heads were outlined suddenlyin the white light of the moon, but disappeared at once, lost againin the dark tufts of grass.

He had gained his information.

The reporter's acute ear caught a gliding in his direction, a slightswish of twigs; then all at once a shadow grew by his side and hefelt the cold of a revolver barrel on his temple. He said"Koupriane," and at once a hand seized his and pressed it.

The night had become black again. He murmured: "How is it you arehere in person?"

The Prefect of Police whispered in his ear:

"I have been informed that something will happen to-night. Natachawent to Krestowsky and exchanged some words with Annouchka there.Prince Galitch is involved, and it is an affair of State."

"Natacha has returned?" inquired Rouletabille.

"Yes, a long time ago. She ought to be in bed. In any case she ispretending to be abed. The light from her chamber, in the windowover the garden, has been put out."

"Have you warned Matrena Petrovna?"

"Yes, I have let her know that she must keep on the sharp look-outto-night."

"That's a mistake. I shouldn't have told her anything. She willtake such extra precautions that the others will be instantlywarned."

"I have told her she should not go to the ground-floor at all thisnight, and that she must not leave the general's chamber."

"That is perfect, if she will obey you."

"You see I have profited by all your information. I have followedyour instructions. The road from the Krestowsky is undersurveillance."

"Perhaps too much. How are you planning?"

"We will let them enter. I don't know whom I have to deal with.I want to strike a sure blow. I shall take him in the act. No moredoubt after this, you trust me."

"Adieu."

"Where are you going?"

"To bed. I have paid my debt to my host. I have the right to somerepose now. Good luck!"

But Koupriane had seized his hand.

"Listen."

With a little attention they detected a light stroke on the water.If a boat was moving at this time for this bank of the Neva andwished to remain hidden, the right moment had certainly been chosen.A great black cloud covered the moon; the wind was light. The boatwould have time to get from one bank to the other without beingdiscovered. Rouletabille waited no longer. On all-fours he ranlike a beast, rapidly and silently, and rose behind the wall of thevilla, where he made a turn, reached the gate, aroused the dvornicksand demanded Ermolai, who opened the gate for him.

"The Barinia?" he said.

Ermolai pointed his finger to the bedroom floor.

"Caracho!"

Rouletabille was already across the garden and had hoisted himselfby his fingers to the window of Natacha's chamber, where he listened.He plainly heard Natacha walking about in the dark chamber. He fellback lightly onto his feet, mounted the veranda steps and opened thedoor, then closed it so lightly that Ermolai, who watched him fromoutside not two feet away, did not hear the slightest grinding ofthe hinges. Inside the villa Rouletabille advanced on tiptoe. Hefound the door of the drawing-room open. The door of thesitting-room had not been closed, or else had been reopened. Heturned in his tracks, felt in the dark for a chair and sat down,with his hand on his revolver in his pocket, waiting for the eventsthat would not delay long now. Above he heard distinctly from timeto time the movements of Matrena Petrovna. And this would evidentlygive a sense of security to those who needed to have the ground-floorfree this night. Rouletabille imagined that the doors of the roomson the ground-floor had been left open so that it would be easierfor those who would be below to hear what was happening upstairs.And perhaps he was not wrong.

Suddenly there was a vertical bar of pale light from the sitting-roomthat overlooked the Neva. He deduced two things: first, that thewindow was already slightly open, then that the moon was out fromthe clouds again. The bar of light died almost instantly, butRouletabille's eyes, now used to the obscurity, still distinguishedthe open line of the window. There the shade was less deep.Suddenly he felt the blood pound at his temples, for the line of theopen window grew larger, increased, and the shadow of a man graduallyrose on the balcony. Rouletabille drew his revolver.

The man stood up immediately behind one of the shutters and strucka light blow on the glass. Placed as he was now he could be seenno more. His shadow mixed with the shadow of the shutter. At thenoise on the glass Natacha's door had opened cautiously, and sheentered the sitting-room. On tiptoe she went quickly to the windowand opened it. The man entered. The little light that by now wascommencing to dawn was enough to show Rouletabille that Natachastill wore the toilette in which he had seen her that same eveningat Krestowsky. As for the man, he tried in vain to identify him;he was only a dark mass wrapped in a mantle. He leaned over andkissed Natacha's hand. She said only one word: "Scan!" (Quickly).

But she had no more than said it before, under a vigorous attack,the shutters and the two halves of the window were thrown wide, andsilent shadows jumped rapidly onto the balcony and sprang into thevilla. Natacha uttered a shrill cry in which Rouletabille believedstill he heard more of despair than terror, and the shadows threwthemselves on the man; but he, at the first alarm, had thrownhimself upon the carpet and had slipped from them between theirlegs. He regained the balcony and jumped from it as the othersturned toward him. At least, it was so that Rouletabille believedhe saw the mysterious struggle go in the half-light, amid mostimpressive silence, after that frightened cry of Natacha's. Thewhole affair had lasted only a few seconds, and the man was stillhanging over the balcony, when from the bottom of the hall a newperson sprang. It was Matrena Petrovna.

Warned by Koupriane that something would happen that night, andforeseeing that it would happen on the ground-floor where she wasforbidden to be, she had found nothing better to do than to makeher faithful maid go secretly to the bedroom floor, with orders towalk about there all night, to make all think she herself was nearthe general, while she remained below, hidden in the dining-room.

Matrena Petrovna now threw herself out onto the balcony, crying inRussian, "Shoot! Shoot!" In just that moment the man was hesitatingwhether to risk the jump and perhaps break his neck, or descend lessrapidly by the gutter-pipe. A policeman fired and missed him, andthe man, after firing back and wounding the policeman, disappeared.It was still too far from dawn for them to see clearly what happenedbelow, where the barking of Brownings alone was heard. And therecould be nothing more sinister than the revolver-shots unaccompaniedby cries in the mists of the morning. The man, before hedisappeared, had had only time by a quick kick to throw down one ofthe two ladders which had been used by the police in climbing; downthe other one all the police in a bunch, even to the wounded one,went sliding, falling, rising, running after the shadow which fledstill, discharging the Browning steadily; other shadows rose fromthe river-bank, hovering in the mist. Suddenly Koupniane's voicewas heard shouting orders, calling upon his agents to take thequarry alive or dead. From the balcony Matrena Petrovna cried outalso, like a savage, and Rouletabille tried in vain to keep herquiet. She was delirious at the thought "The Other" might escapeyet. She fired a revolver, she also, into the group, not knowingwhom she might wound. Rouletabille grabbed her arm and as sheturned on him angrily she observed Natacha, who, leaning until shealmost fell over the balcony, her lips trembling with deliriousutterance, followed as well as she could the progress of thestruggle, trying to understand what happened below, under the trees,near the Neva, where the tumult by now extended. Matrena Petrovnapulled her back by the arms. Then she took her by the neck andthrew her into the drawing-room in a heap. When she had almoststrangled her step-daughter, Matrena Petrovna saw that the generalwas there. He appeared in the pale glimmerings of dawn like aspecter. By what miracle had Feodor Feodorovitch been able todescend the stairs and reach there? How had it been brought about?She saw him tremble with anger or with wretchedness under the foldsof the soldier's cape that floated about him. He demanded in ahoarse voice, "What is it?"

Matrena Petrovna threw herself at his feet, made the orthodox signof the Cross, as if she wished to summon God to witness, and then,pointing to Natacha, she denounced his daughter to her husband asshe would have pointed her out to a judge.

"The one, Feodor Feodorovitch, who has wished more than once toassassinate you, and who this night has opened the datcha to yourassassin is your daughter."

The general held himself up by his two hands against the wall, and,looking at Matrena and Natacha, who now were both upon the floorbefore him like suppliants, he said to Matrena:

"It is you who assassinate me."

"Me! By the living God!" babbled Matrena Petrovna desperately."If I had been able to keep this from you, Jesus would have beengood! But I say no more to crucify you. Feodor Feodorovitch,question your daughter, and if what I have said is not true, killme, kill me as a lying, evil beast. I will say thank you, thankyou, and I will die happier than if what I have said was true. Ah,I long to be dead! Kill me!"

Feodor Feodorovitch pushed her back with his stick as one wouldpush a worm in his path. Without saying anything further, she rosefrom her knees and looked with her haggard eyes, with her crazedface, at Rouletabille, who grasped her arm. If she had had herhands still free she would not have hesitated a second in wreakingjustice upon herself under this bitter fate of alienating Feodor.And it seemed frightful to Rouletabille that he should be presentat one of those horrible family dramas the issue of which in thewild times of Peter the Great would have sent the general to thehangman either as a father or as a husband.

The general did not deign even to consider for any length of timeMatrena's delirium. He said to his daughter, who shook with sobson the floor, "Rise, Natacha Feodorovna." And Feodor's daughterunderstood that her father never would believe in her guilt. Shedrew herself up towards him and kissed his hands like a happy slave.

At this moment repeated blows shook the veranda door. Matrena, thewatch-dog, anxious to die after Feodor's reproach, but still at herpost, ran toward what she believed to be a new danger. But sherecognized Koupriane's voice, which called on her to open. She lethim in herself.

"What is it?" she implored.

"Well, he is dead."

A cry answered him. Natacha had heard.

"But who - who - who?" questioned Matrena breathlessly.

Koupriane went over to Feodor and grasped his hands.

"General," he said, "there was a man who had sworn your ruin andwho was made an instrument by your enemies. We have just killedthat man."

"Do I know him?" demanded Feodor.

"He is one of your friends, you have treated him like a son."

"His name?"

"Ask your daughter, General."

Feodor turned toward Natacha, who burned Koupriane with her gaze,trying to learn what this news was he brought - the truth or a ruse.

"You know the man who wished to kill me, Natacha?"

"No," she replied to her father, in accents of perfect fury. "No,I don't know any such man."

"Mademoiselle," said Koupriane, in a firm, terribly hostile voice,"you have yourself, with your own hands, opened that window to-night;and you have opened it to him many other times besides. Whileeveryone else here does his duty and watches that no person shall beable to enter at night the house where sleeps General Trebassof,governor of Moscow, condemned to death by the Central RevolutionaryCommittee now reunited at Presnia, this is what you do; it is youwho introduce the enemy into this place."

"Answer, Natacha; tell me, yes or no, whether you have let anybodyinto this house by night."

"Father, it is true."

Feodor roared like a lion:

"His name!"

"Monsieur will tell you himself," said Natacha, in a voice thickwith terror, and she pointed to Koupriane. "Why does he not tellyou himself the name of that person? He must know it, if the manis dead."

"And if the man is not dead," replied Feodor, who visibly held ontohimself, "if that man, whom you helped to enter my house this night,has succeeded in escaping, as you seem to hope, will you tell us hisname?"

"I could not tell it, Father."

"And if I prayed you to do so?"

Natacha desperately shook her head.

"And if I order you?"

"You can kill me, Father, but I will not pronounce that name."

"Wretch!"

He raised his stick toward her. Thus Ivan the Terrible had killedhis son with a blow of his boar-spear.

But Natacha, instead of bowing her head beneath the blow thatmenaced her, turned toward Koupriane and threw at him in accents oftriumph:

"He is not dead. If you bad succeeded in taking him, dead or alive,you would already have his name."

Koupriane took two steps toward her, put his hand on her shoulderand said:

"Michael Nikolajevitch."

"Michael Korsakoff!" cried the general.

Matrena Petrovna, as if revolted by that suggestion, stood uprightto repeat:

"Michael Korsakoff!"

The general could not believe his ears, and was about to protestwhen he noticed that his daughter had turned away and was trying toflee to her room. He stopped her with a terrible gesture.

"Natacha, you are going to tell us what Michael Korsakoff came hereto do to-night."

"Feodor Feodorovitch, he came to poison you."

It was Matrena who spoke now and whom nothing could have kept silent,for she saw in Natacha's attempt at flight the most sinisterconfession. Like a vengeful fury she told over with cries andterrible gestures what she had experienced, as if once more stretchedbefore her the hand armed with the poison, the mysterious hand abovethe pillow of her poor invalid, her dear, rigorous tyrant; she toldthem about the preceding night and all her terrors, and from herlips, by her voluble staccato utterance that ominous recital hadgrotesque emphasis. Finally she told all that she had done, sheand the little Frenchman, in order not to betray their suspicionsto The Other, in order to take finally in their own trap all thosewho for so many days and nights schemed for the death of FeodorFeodorovitch. As she ended she pointed out Rouletabille to Feodorand cried, "There is the one who has saved you."

Natacha, as she listened to this tragic recital, restrained herselfseveral times in order not to interrupt, and Rouletabille, who waswatching her closely, saw that she had to use almost superhumanefforts in order to achieve that. All the horror of what seemed tobe to her as well as to Feodor a revelation of Michael's crime didnot subdue her, but seemed, on the contrary, to restore to her infull force all the life that a few seconds earlier had fled from her.Matrena had hardly finished her cry, "There is the one who hassaved you," before Natacha cried in her turn, facing the reporterwith a look full of the most frightful hate, "There is the one whohas been the death of an innocent man!" She turned to her father."Ah, papa, let me, let me say that Michael Nikolaievitch, who camehere this evening, I admit, and whom, it is true, I let into thehouse, that Michael Nikolaievitch did not come here yesterday, andthat the man who has tried to poison you is certainly someone else."

At these words Rouletabille turned pale, but he did not let himselflose self-control. He replied simply:

"No, mademoiselle, it was the same man."

And Koupriane felt compelled to add:

"Anyway, we have found the proof of Michael Nikolaievitch's relationswith the revolutionaries."

"Where have you found that?" questioned the young girl, turningtoward the Chief of Police a face ravished with anguish.

"At Krestowsky, mademoiselle."

She looked a long time at him as though she would penetrate to thebottom of his thoughts.

"I will tell you. `At the villa, in his chamber. We forced thelock of his bureau."

She seemed to breathe again, but her father took her brutally bythe arm.

"Come, Natacha, you are going to tell us what that man was doinghere to-night."

"In her chamber!" cried Matrena Petrovna.

Natacha turned toward Matrena:

"What do you believe, then? Tell me now."

"And I, what ought I to believe?" muttered Feodor. "You have nottold me yet. You did not know that man had relations with myenemies. You are innocent of that, perhaps. I wish to think so.I wish it, in the name of Heaven I wish it. But why did youreceive him? Why? Why did you bring him in here, as a robberor as a..."

"Oh, papa, you know that I love Boris, that I love him with all myheart, and that I would never belong to anyone but him."

"Then, then, then. - speak!"

The young girl had reached the crisis.

"Ah, Father, Father, do not question me! You, you above all, donot question me now. I can say nothing! There is nothing I cantell you. Excepting that I am sure - sure, you understand - thatMichael Nikolaievitch did not come here last night."

"He did come," insisted Rouletabille in a slightly troubled voice.

"He came here with poison. He came here to poison your father,Natacha," moaned Matrena Petrovna, who twined her hands in gesturesof sincere and naive tragedy.

"And I," replied the daughter of Feodor ardently, with an accent ofconviction which made everyone there vibrate, and particularlyRouletabille, "and I, I tell you it was not he, that it was not he,that it could not possibly be he. I swear to you it was another,another."

"But then, this other, did you let him in as well?" said Koupriane.

"Ah, yes, yes. It was I. It was I. It was I who left the windowand blinds open. Yes, it is I who did that. But I did not wait forthe other, the other who came to assassinate. As to MichaelNikolaievitch, I swear to you, my father, by all that is most sacredin heaven and on earth, that he could not have committed the crimethat you say. And now - kill me, for there is nothing more I cansay."

"The poison," replied Koupriane coldly, "the poison that he pouredinto the general's potion was that arsenate of soda which was onthe grapes the Marshal of the Court brought here. Those grapeswere left by the Marshal, who warned Michael Nikolaievitch andBoris Alexandrovitch to wash them. The grapes disappeared. IfMichael is innocent, do you accuse Boris?"

Natacha, who seemed to have suddenly lost all power for defendingherself, moaned, begged, railed, seemed dying.

"No, no. Don't accuse Boris. He has nothing to do with it. Don'taccuse Michael. Don't accuse anyone so long as you don't know. Butthese two are innocent. Believe me. Believe me. Ah, how shall Isay it, how shall I persuade you! I am not able to say anything toyou. And you have killed Michael. Ah, what have you done, whathave you done!"

"We have suppressed a man," said the icy voice of Koupriane, "whowas merely the agent for the base deeds of Nihilism."

She succeeded in recovering a new energy that in her depths ofdespair they would have supposed impossible. She shook her fistsat Koupriane:

"It is not true, it is not true. These are slanders, infamies! Theinventions of the police! Papers devised to incriminate him. Thereis nothing at all of what you said you found at his house. It isnot possible. It is not true."

"Where are those papers?" demanded the curt voice of Feodor. "Bringthem here at once, Koupriane; I wish to see them."

Koupriane was slightly troubled, and this did not escape Natacha,who cried:

"Yes, yes, let him give us them, let him bring them if he has them.But he hasn't," she clamored with a savage joy. "He has nothing.You can see, papa, that he has nothing. He would already havebrought them out. He has nothing. I tell you he has nothing. Ah,he has nothing! He has nothing!"

And she threw herself on the floor, weeping, sobbing, "He hasnothing, he has nothing!" She seemed to weep for joy.

"Is that true?" demanded Feodor Feodorovitch, with his most sombermanner. "Is it true, Koupriane, that you have nothing?"

"It is true, General, that we have found nothing. Everything hadalready been carried away."

But Natacha uttered a veritable torrent of glee:

"He has found nothing! Yet he accuses him of being allied with therevolutionaries. Why? Why? Because I let him in? But I, am I arevolutionary? Tell me. Have I sworn to kill papa? I? I? Ah, hedoesn't know what to say. You see for yourself, papa, he is silent.He has lied. He has lied."

"Why have you made this false statement, Koupriane?"

"Oh, we have suspected Michael for some time, and truly, after whathas just happened, we cannot have any doubt."

"Yes, but you declared you had papers, and you have not. That isabominable procedure, Koupriane," replied Feodor sternly. "I haveheard you condemn such expedients many times."

"General! We are sure, you hear, we are absolutely sure that theman who tried to poison you yesterday and the man to-day who isdead are one and the same."

"And what reason have you for being so sure? It is necessary totell it," insisted the general, who trembled with distress andimpatience.

"Yes, let him tell now."

"Ask monsieur," said Koupriane.

They all turned to Rouletabille.

The reporter replied, affecting a coolness that perhaps he did notentirely feel:

"I am able to state to you, as I already have before Monsieur thePrefect of Police, that one, and only one, person has left thetraces of his various climbings on the wall and on the balcony."

"Listen to me, monsieur. A man came here this night. That concernsonly me. No one has any right to be astonished excepting myself. Imake it my own affair, an affair between my daughter and me. Butyou, you have just told us that you are sure that man is an assassin.Then, you see, that calls for something else. Proofs are necessary,and I want the proofs at once. You speak of traces; very well, wewill go and examine those traces together. And I wish for your sake,monsieur, that I shall be as convinced by them as you are."

Rouletabille quietly disengaged his wrist and replied with perfectcalm:

"Now, monsieur, I am no longer able to prove anything to you."

"Why?"

"Because the ladders of the police agents have wiped out all myproofs, monsieur.

"So now there remains for us only your word, only your belief inyourself. And if you are mistaken?"

"He would never admit it, papa," cried Natacha. "Ah, it is he whodeserves the fate Michael Nikolaievitch has met just now. Isn't itso? Don't you know it? And that will be your eternal remorse! Isn'tthere something that always keeps you from admitting that you aremistaken? You have had an innocent man killed. Now, you know wellenough, you know well that I would not have admitted MichaelNikolaievitch here if I had believed he was capable of wishing topoison my father."

He said it in such a tone that Natacha continued to look at himwith incomprehensible anguish in her eyes. Ah, the baffling ofthose two regards, the mute scene between those two young people,one of whom wished to make himself understood and the other afraidbeyond all other things of being thoroughly understood. Natachamurmured:

"How he looks at me! See, he is the demon; yes, yes, the littledomovoi, the little domovoi. But look out, poor wretch; you don'tknow what you have done."

She turned brusquely toward Koupriane:

"Where is the body of Michael Nikolaievitch?" said she. "I wish tosee it. I must see it."

Feodor Feodorovitch had fallen, as though asleep, upon a chair.Matrena Petrovna dared not approach him. The giant appeared hurtto the death, disheartened forever. What neither bombs, nor bullets,nor poison had been able to do, the single idea of his daughter'sco-operation in the work of horror plotted about him - or ratherthe impossibility he faced of understanding Natacha's attitude, hermysterious conduct, the chaos of her explanations, her insensatecries, her protestations of innocence, her accusations, her menaces,her prayers and all her disorder, the avowed fact of her share inthat tragic nocturnal adventure where Michael Nikolaievitch foundhis death, had knocked over Feodor Feodorovitch like a straw. Oneinstant he sought refuge in some vague hope that Koupriane was lessassured than he pretended of the orderly's guilt. But that, afterall, was only a detail of no importance in his eyes. What alonemattered was the significance of Natacha's act, and the unhappygirl seemed not to be concerned over what he would think of it.She was there to fight against Koupriane, Rouletabille and MatrenaPetrovna, defending her Michael Nikolajevitch, while he, the father,after having failed to overawe her just now, was there in a cornersuffering agonizedly.

Koupriane walked over to him and said:

"Listen to me carefully, Feodor Feodorovitch. He who speaks to youis Head of the Police by the will of the Tsar, and your friend bythe grace of God. If you do not demand before us, who are acquaintedwith all that has happened and who know how to keep any necessarysecret, if you do not demand of your daughter the reason for herconduct with Michael Nikolaievitch, and if she does not tell youin all sincerity, there is nothing more for me to do here. My menhave already been ordered away from this house as unworthy to guardthe most loyal subject of His Majesty; I have not protested, butnow I in my turn ask you to prove to me that the most dangerousenemy you have had in your house is not your daughter."

These words, which summed up the horrible situation, came as arelief for Feodor. Yes, they must know. Koupriane was right. Shemust speak. He ordered his daughter to tell everything, everything.

Natacha fixed Koupriane again with her look of hatred to the death,turned from him and repeated in a firm voice:

Natacha uttered a cry like a wounded beast and fell at her father'sfeet. She gathered them within her supplicating arms. She pressedthem to her breasts. She sobbed from the bottom of her heart. Andhe, not comprehending, let her lie there, distant, hostile, somber.Then she moaned, distractedly, and wept bitterly, and the dramaticatmosphere in which she thus suddenly enveloped Feodor made it allsound like those cries of an earlier time when the all-powerful,punishing father appeared in the women's apartments to punish theculpable ones.

"My father! Dear Father! Look at me! Look at me! Have pity onme, and do not require me to speak when I must be silent forever.And believe me! Do not believe these men! Do not believe MatrenaPetrovna. And am I not your daughter? Your very own daughter! YourNatacha Feodorovna! I cannot make things dear to you. No, no, bythe Holy Virgin Mother of Jesus I cannot explain. By the holy ikons,it is because I must not. By my mother, whom I have not known andwhose place you have taken, oh, my father, ask me nothing more!Ask me nothing more! But take me in your arms as you did when Iwas little; embrace me, dear father; love me. I never have had suchneed to be loved. Love me! I am miserable. Unfortunate me, whocannot even kill myself before your eyes to prove my innocence andmy love. Papa, Papa! What will your arms be for in the days leftyou to live, if you no longer wish to press me to your heart? Papa!Papa!"

She laid her head on Feodor's knees. Her hair had come down andhung about her in a magnificent disorderly mass of black.

Then Feodor wept. His great tears fell upon Natacha's tears. Heraised her head and demanded simply in a broken voice:

"You can tell me nothing now? But when will you tell me?"

Natacha lifted her eyes to his, then her look went past him towardheaven, and from her lips came just one word, in a sob:

"Never."

Matrena Petrovna, Koupriane and the reporter shuddered before thehigh and terrible thing that happened then. Feodor had taken hisdaughter's face between his hands. He looked long at those eyesraised toward heaven, the mouth which had just uttered the word"Never," then, slowly, his rude lips went to the tortured, quiveringlips of the girl. He held her close. She raised her head wildly,triumphantly, and cried, with arm extended toward Matrena Petrovna:

"He believes me! He believes me! And you would have believed mealso if you had been my real mother."

Her head fell back and she dropped unconscious to the floor. Feodorfell to his knees, tending her, deploring her, motioning the othersout of the room.

"Go away! All of you, go! All! You, too, Matrena Petrovna. Goaway!"

They disappeared, terrified by his savage gesture.

In the little datcha across the river at Krestowsky there was abody. Secret Service agents guarded it while they waited for theirchief. Michael Nikolaievitch had come there to die, and the policehad reached him just at his last breath. They were behind him as,with the death-rattle in his throat, he pulled himself into hischamber and fell in a heap. Katharina the Bohemian was there. Shebent her quick-witted, puzzled head over his death agony. Thepolice swarmed everywhere, ransacking, forcing locks, pullingdrawers from the bureau and tables, emptying the cupboards. Theirsearch took in everything, even to ripping the mattresses, and notrespecting the rooms of Boris Mourazoff, who was away this night.They searched thoroughly, but they found absolutely nothing theywere looking for in Michael's rooms. But they accumulated amultitude of publications that belonged to Boris: Western books,essays on political economy, a history of the French Revolution,and verses that a man ought to hang for. They put them all underseal. During the search Michael died in Katharina's arms. Shehad held him close, after opening his clothes over the chest,doubtless to make his last breaths easier. The unfortunate officerhad received a bullet at the back of the head just after he hadplunged into the Neva from the rear of the Trebassof datcha andstarted to swim across. It was a miracle that he had managed tokeep going. Doubtless he hoped to die in peace if only he couldreach his own house. He apparently had believed he could managethat once he had broken through his human bloodhounds. He did notknow he was recognized and his place of retreat therefore known.

Now the police had gone from cellar to garret. Koupriane came fromthe Trebassof villa and joined them, Rouletabille followed him.The reporter could not stand the sight of that body, that still hada lingering warmth, of the great open eyes that seemed to stare athim, reproaching him for this violent death. He turned away indistaste, and perhaps a little in fright. Koupriane caught themovement.

"Regrets?" he queried.

"Yes," said Rouletabille. "A death always must be regretted. Nonethe less, he was a criminal. But I'm sincerely sorry he died beforehe had been driven to confess, even though we are sure of it."

"Being in the pay of the Nihilists, you mean? That is still youropinion?" asked Koupriane.

"Yes."

"You know that nothing has been found here in his rooms. The onlycompromising papers that have been found belong to Boris Mourazoff."

"Why do you say that?"

"Oh - nothing."

Koupriane questioned his men further. They replied categorically.No, nothing had been found that directly incriminated anybody; andsuddenly Rouletabille noted that the conversation of the police andtheir chief had grown more animated. Koupriane had become angryand was violently reproaching them. They excused themselves withvivid gesture and rapid speech.

Koupriane started away. Rouletabille followed him. What hadhappened?

As he came up behind Koupriane, he asked the question. In a fewcurt words, still hurrying on, Koupriane told the reporter he hadjust learned that the police had left the little Bohemian Katharinaalone for a moment with the expiring officer. Katharina acted ashousekeeper for Michael and Boris. She knew the secrets of themboth. The first thing any novice should have known was to keep aconstant eye upon her, and now no one knew where she was. She mustbe searched for and found at once, for she had opened Michael'sshirt, and therein probably lay the reason that no papers were foundon the corpse when the police searched it. The absence of papers,of a portfolio, was not natural.

The chase commenced in the rosy dawn of the isles. Alreadyblood-like tints were on the horizon. Some of the police criedthat they had the trail. They ran under the trees, because it wasalmost certain she had taken the narrow path leading to the bridgethat joins Krestowsky to Kameny-Ostrow. Some indications discoveredby the police who swarmed to right and left of the path confirmedthis hypothesis. And no carriage in sight! They all ran on,Koupriane among the first. Rouletabille kept at his heels, but hedid not pass him. Suddenly there were cries and calls among thepolice. One pointed out something below gliding upon the slopingdescent. It was little Kathanna. She flew like the wind, but ina distracted course. She had reached Kameny-Ostrow on the westbank. "Oh, for a carriage, a horse!" clamored Koupriane, who hadleft his turn-out at Eliaguine. "The proof is there. It is thefinal proof of everything that is escaping us!"

Dawn was enough advanced now to show the ground clearly. Katharinawas easily discernible as she reached the Eliaguine bridge. Thereshe was in Eliaguine-Ostrow. What was she doing there? Was shegoing to the Trebassof villa? What would she have to say to them?No, she swerved to the right. The police raced behind her. Shewas still far ahead, and seemed untiring. Then she disappearedamong the trees, in the thicket, keeping still to the right.Koupriane gave a cry of joy. Going that way she must be taken. Hegave some breathless orders for the island to be barred. She couldnot escape now! She could not escape! But where was she going?Koupriane knew that island better than anybody. He took a shortcut to reach the other side, toward which Katharina seemed to beheading, and all at once he nearly fell over the girl, who gave asquawk of surprise and rushed away, seeming all arms and legs.

"Stop, or I fire!" cried Koupriane, and he drew his revolver. Buta hand grabbed it from him.

"Not that!" said Rouletabille, as be threw the revolver far fromthem. Koupriane swore at him and resumed the chase. His furymultiplied his strength, his agility; he almost reached Katharina,who was almost out of breath, but Rouletabille threw himself intothe Chief's arms and they rolled together upon the grass. WhenKoupriane rose, it was to see Katharina mounting in mad haste thestairs that led to the Barque, the floating restaurant of theStrielka. Cursing Rouletabille, but believing his prey easilycaptured now, the Chief in his turn hurried to the Barque, intowhich Katharina had disappeared. He reached the bottom of thestairs. On the top step, about to descend from the festive place,the form of Prince Galltch appeared. Koupriane received the sightlike a blow stopping him short in his ascent. Galitch had anexultant air which Koupriane did not mistake. Evidently he hadarrived too late. He felt the certainty of it in profounddiscouragement. And this appearance of the prince on the Barqueexplained convincingly enough the reason for Katharina's flighthere.

If the Bohemian had filched the papers or the portfolio from thedead, it was the prince now who had them in his pocket.

Koupriane, as he saw the prince about to pass him, trembled. Theprince saluted him and ironically amused himself by inquiring:

"Well, well, how do you do, my dear Monsieur Koupriane. YourExcellency has risen in good time this morning, it seems to me.Or else it is I who start for bed too late."

"Prince," said Koupriane, "my men are in pursuit of a little Bohemiannamed Katharina, well known in the restaurants where she sings. Wehave seen her go into the Barque. Have you met her by any chance?"

"Good Lord, Monsieur Koupriane, I am not the concierge of the Barque,and I have not noticed anything at all, and nobody. Besides, I amnaturally a little sleepy. Pardon me."

"Prince, it is not possible that you have not seen Katharina."

"Oh, Monsieur the Prefect of Police, if I had seen her I would nottell you about it, since you are pursuing her. Do you take me forone of your bloodhounds? They say you have them in all classes,but I insist that I haven't enlisted yet. You have made a mistake,Monsieur Koupriane."

The prince saluted again. But Koupriane still stood in his way.

"Prince, consider that this matter is very serious. MichaelNikolaievitch, General Trebassof's orderly, is dead, and thislittle girl has stolen his papers from his body. All persons whohave spoken with Katharina will be under suspicion. This is anaffair of State, monsieur, which may reach very far. Can youswear to me that you have not seen, that you have not spoken toKatharina?"

The prince looked at Koupriane so insolently that the Prefect turnedpale with rage. Ah, if he were able - if he only dared! - but suchmen as this were beyond him. Galitch walked past him without a wordof answer, and ordered the schwitzar to call him a carriage.

"Very well," said Koupriane, "I will make my report to the Tsar."

Galitch turned. He was as pale as Koupriane.

"In that case, monsieur," said he, "don't forget to add that I amHis Majesty's most humble servant."

The carriage drew up. The prince stepped in. Koupriane watchedhim roll away, raging at heart and with his fists doubled. Justthen his men came up.

"Go. Search," he said roughiy, pointing into the Barque.

They scattered through the establishment, entering all the rooms.Cries of irritation and of protest arose. Those lingering afterthe latest of late suppers were not pleased at this invasion of thepolice. Everybody had to rise while the police looked under thetables, the benches, the long table-cloths. They went into thepantries and down into the bold. No sign of Katharina. SuddenlyKoupriane, who leaned against a netting and looked vaguely out uponthe horizon, waiting for the outcome of the search, got a start.Yonder, far away on the other side of the river, between a littlewood and the Staria Derevnia, a light boat drew to the shore, and alittle black spot jumped from it like a flea. Koupriane recognizedthe little black spot as Kathanna. She was safe. Now he could notreach her. It would be useless to search the maze of the Bohemianquarter, where her country-people lived in full control, withcustoms and privileges that had never been infringed. The entireBohemian population of the capital would have risen against him.It was Prince Galitch who had made him fail. One of his men cameto him:

"No luck," said he. "We have not found Katharina, but she has beenhere nevertheless. She met Prince Galitch for just a minute, andgave him something, then went over the other side into a canoe."

"Very well," and the Prefect shrugged his shoulders. "I was sure ofit."

He felt more and more, exasperated. He went down along the riveredge and the first person he saw was Rouletabille, who waited forhim without any impatience, seated philosophically on a bench.

"I was looking for you," cried the Prefect. "We have failed. Byyour fault! If you had not thrown yourself into my arms -"

"I did it on purpose," declared the reporter.

"What! What is that you say? You did it on purpose?"

Koupriane choked with rage.

"Your Excellency," said Rouletabille, taking him by the arm, "calmyourself. They are watching us. Come along and have a cup of teaat Cubat's place. Easy now, as though we were out for a walk."

"Will you explain to me?"

"No, no, Your Excellency. Remember that I have promised you GeneralTrebassof's life in exchange for your prisoner's. Very well; bythrowing myself in your arms and keeping you from reaching Katharina,I saved the general's life. It is very simple."

"Are you laughing at me? Do you think you can mock me?"

But the prefect saw quickly that Rouletabille was not fooling andhad no mockery in his manner.

"Monsieur," he insisted, "since you speak seriously, I certainlywish to understand -"

"It is useless," said Rouletabille. "It is very necessary that youshould not understand."

"Monsieur Koupriane, recall what Natacha Feodorovna as she raised herlovely eyes to heaven, replied to her father, when he, also, wishedto understand: 'Never.'"

XI

THE POISON CONTINUES

At ten o'clock that morning Rouletabille went to the Trebassofvilla, which had its guard of secret agents again, a double guard,because Koupriane was sure the Nihilists would not delay in avengingMichael's death. Rouletabille was met by Ermolai, who would notallow him to enter. The faithful servant uttered some explanationin Russian, which the young man did not understand, or, rather,Rouletabille understood perfectly from his manner that henceforththe door of the villa was closed to him. In vain he insisted onseeing the general, Matrena Petrovna and Mademoiselle Natacha.Ermolai made no reply but "Niet, niet, niet." The reporter turnedaway without having seen anyone, and walked away deeply depressed.He went afoot clear into the city, a long promenade, during whichhis brain surged with the darkest forebodings. As he passed by theDepartment of Police he resolved to see Koupriane again. He wentin, gave his name, and was ushered at once to the Chief of Police,whom he found bent over a long report that he was reading throughwith noticeable agitation.

"Gounsovski has sent me this," he said in a rough voice, pointingto the report. "Gounsovski, 'to do me a service,' desires me toknow that he is fully aware of all that happened at the Trebassofdatcha last night. He warns me that the revolutionaries havedecided to get through with the general at once, and that two ofthem have been given the mission to enter the datcha in any waypossible. They will have bombs upon their bodies and will blowthe bombs and themselves up together as soon as they are beside thegeneral. Who are the two victims designated for this horriblevengeance, and who have light-heartedly accepted such a death forthemselves as well as for the general? That is what we don't know.That is what we would have known, perhaps, if you had not preventedme from seizing the papers that Prince Galitch has now," Kouprianefinished, turning hostilely toward Rouletabille.

Rouletabille had turned pale.

"Don't regret what happened to the papers," he said. "It is I whotell you not to. But what you say doesn't surprise me. They mustbelieve that Natacha has betrayed them."

"Ah, then you admit at last that she really is their accomplice?"

"I haven't said that and I don't admit it. But I know what I mean,and you, you can't. Only, know this one thing, that at the presentmoment I am the only person able to save you in this horriblesituation. To do that I must see Natacha at once. Make herunderstand this, while I wait at my hotel for word. I'll not leaveit."

Rouletabille saluted Koupriane and went out.

Two days passed, during which Rouletabille did not receive any wordfrom either Natacha or Koupriane, and tried in vain to see them.He made a trip for a few hours to Finland, going as far as Pergalovo,an isolated town said to be frequented by the revolutionaries, thenreturned, much disturbed, to his hotel, after having written a lastletter to Natacha imploring an interview. The minutes passed veryslowly for him in the hotel's vestibule, where he had seemed to havetaken up a definite residence.

Installed on a bench, he seemed to have become part of the hotelstaff, and more than one traveler took him for an interpreter.Others thought he was an agent of the Secret Police appointed tostudy the faces of those arriving and departing. What was hewaiting for, then? Was it for Annouchka to return for a luncheonor dinner in that place that she sometimes frequented? And did heat the same time keep watch upon Annouchka's apartments just acrossthe way? If that was so, he could only bewail his luck, forAnnouchka did not appear either at her apartments or the hotel, orat the Krestowsky establishment, which had been obliged to suppressher performance. Rouletabille naturally thought, in the latterconnection, that some vengeance by Gounsovski lay back of this,since the head of the Secret Service could hardly forget the way hehad been treated. The reporter could see already the poor singer,in spite of all her safeguards and the favor of the Imperial family,on the road to the Siberian steppes or the dungeons of Schlusselbourg.

"My, what a country!" he murmured.

But his thoughts soon quit Annouchka and returned to the object ofhis main preoccupation. He waited for only one thing, and for thatas soon as possible - to have a private interview with Natacha. Hehad written her ten letters in two days, but they all remainedunanswered. It was an answer that he waited for so patiently inthe vestibule of the hotel - so patiently, but so nervously, sofeverishly.

When the postman entered, poor Rouletabille's heart beat rapidly.On that answer he waited for depended the formidable part he meantto play before quitting Russia. He had accomplished nothing up tonow, unless he could play his part in this later development.

But the letter did not come. The postman left, and the schwitzar,after examining all the mail, made him a negative sign. Ah, theservants who entered, and the errand-boys, how he looked at them!But they never came for him. Finally, at six o'clock in the eveningof the second day, a man in a frock-coat, with a false astrakhancollar, came in and handed the concierge a letter for JosephRouletabille. The reporter jumped up. Before the man was out thedoor he had torn open the letter and read it. The letter was notfrom Natacha. It was from Gounsovski. This is what it said:

"My dear Monsieur Joseph Rouletabille, if it will not inconvenienceyou, I wish you would come and dine with me to-day. I will lookfor you within two hours. Madame Gounsovski will be pleased to makeyour acquaintance. Believe me your devoted Gounsovski."

Rouletabille considered, and decided:

"I will go. He ought to have wind of what is being plotted, and asfor me, I don't know where Annoucbka has gone. I have more to learnfrom him than he has from me. Besides, as Athanase Georgevitch said,one may regret not accepting the Head of the Okrana's pleasantinvitation."

From six o'clock to seven he still waited vainly for Natacha'sresponse. At seven o'clock, he decided to dress for the dinner.Just as he rose, a messenger arrived. There was still anotherletter for Joseph Rouletabille. This time it was from Natacha, whowrote him:

"General Trebassof and my step-mother will be very happy to haveyou come to dinner to-day. As for myself, monsieur, you will pardonme the order which has closed to you for a number of days a dwellingwhere you have rendered services which I shall not forget all mylife."

The letter ended with a vague polite formula. With the letter inhis hand the reporter sat in thought. He seemed to be askinghimself, "Is it fish or flesh?" Was it a letter of thanks or ofmenace? That was what he could not decide. Well, he would soonknow, for he had decided to accept that invitation. Anything thatbrought him and Natacha into communication at the moment was a thingof capital importance to him. Half-an-hour later he gave theaddress of the villa to an isvotchick, and soon he stepped outbefore the gate where Ermolai seemed to be waiting for him.

Rouletabille was so occupied by thought of the conversation he wasgoing to have with Natacha that he had completely forgotten theexcellent Monsieur Gounsovski and his invitation.

The reporter found Koupriane's agents making a close-linked chainaround the grounds and each watching the other. Matrena had notwished any agent to be in house. He showed Koupriane's pass andentered.

Ermolai ushered Rouletabille in with shining face. He seemed gladto have him there again. He bowed low before him and uttered manycompliments, of which the reporter did not understand a word.Rouletablle passed on, entered the garden and saw Matrena Petrovnathere walking with her step-daughter. They seemed on the best ofterms with each other. The grounds wore an air of tranquillity andthe residents seemed to have totally forgotten the somber tragedyof the other night. Matrena and Natacha came smilingly up to theyoung man, who inquired after the general. They both turned andpointed out Feodor Feodorovitch, who waved to him from the heightof the kiosk, where it seemed the table had been spread. They weregoing to dine out of doors this fine night.

"Everything goes very well, very well indeed, dear little domovoi,"said Matrena. "How glad it is to see you and thank you. If youonly knew how I suffered in your absence, I who know how unjust mydaughter was to you. But dear Natacha knows now what she owes you.She doesn't doubt your word now, nor your clear intelligence, littleangel. Michael Nikolaievitch was a monster and he was punished ashe deserved. You know the police have proof now that he was one ofthe Central Revolutionary Committee's most dangerous agents. Andhe an officer! Whom can we trust now!"

"And Monsieur Boris Mourazoff, have you seen him since?" inquiredRouletabille.

"Boris called to see us to-day, to say good-by, but we did notreceive him, under the orders of the police. Natacha has writtento tell him of Koupriane's orders. We have received letters fromhim; he is quitting St. Petersburg.

"What for?"

"Well, after the frightful bloody scene in his little house, whenhe learned how Michael Nikolaievitch had found his death, and afterhe himself had undergone a severe grilling from the police, andwhen he learned the police had sacked his library and gone throughhis papers, he resigned, and has resolved to live from now on outin the country, without seeing anyone, like the philosopher andpoet he is. So far as I am concerned, I think he is doing absolutelyright. When a young man is a poet, it is useless to live like asoldier. Someone has said that, I don't know the name now, andwhen one has ideas that may upset other people, surely they oughtto live in solitude."

Rouletabille looked at Natacha, who was as pale as her white gown,and who added no word to her mother's outburst. They had drawn nearthe kiosk. Rouletabille saluted the general, who called to him tocome up and, when the young man extended his hand, he drew himabruptly nearer and embraced him. To show Rouletabille how activehe was getting again, Feodor Feodorovitch marched up and down thekiosk with only the aid of a stick. He went and came with a sortof wild, furious gayety.

"They haven't got me yet, the dogs. They haven't got me! And one(he was thinking of Michael) who saw me every day was here just forthat. Very well. I ask you where he is now. And yet here I am!An attack! I'm always here! But with a good eye; and I begin tohave a good leg. We shall see. Why, I recollect how, when I wasat Tiflis, there was an insurrection in the Caucasus. We fought.Several times I could feel the swish of bullets past my hair. Mycomrades fell around me like flies. But nothing happened to me,not a thing. And here now! They will not get me, they will notget me. You know how they plan now to come to me, as living bombs.Yes, they have decided on that. I can't press a friend's hand anymore without the fear of seeing him explode. What do you think ofthat? But they won't get me. Come, drink my health. A smallglass of vodka for an appetizer. You see, young man, we are goingto have zakouskis here. What a marvelous panorama! You can seeeverything from here. If the enemy comes," he added with a singularloud laugh, "we can't fail to detect him."

Certainly the kiosk did rise high above the garden and wascompletely detached, no wall being near. They had a clear view.No branches of trees hung over the roof and no tree hid the view.The rustic table of rough wood was covered with a short cloth andwas spread with zakouskis. It was a meal under the open sky, aseat and a glass in the clear azure. The evening could not havebeen softer and clearer. And, as the general felt so gay, therepast would have promised to be most agreeable, if Rouletabillehad not noticed that Matrena Petrovna and Natacha were uneasy anddowncast. The reporter soon saw, too, that all the general'sjoviality was a little excessive. Anyone would have said thatFeodor Feodorovitch spoke to distract himself, to keep himself fromthinking. There was sufficient excuse for him after the outrageousdrama of the other night. Rouletabille noticed further that thegeneral never looked at his daughter, even when he spoke to her.There was too formidable a mystery lying between them for restraintnot to increase day by day. Rouletabille involuntarily shook hishead, saddened by all he saw. His movement was surprised byMatrena Petrovna, who pressed his hand in silence.

"Well, now," said the general, "well, now my children, where is thevodka?"

Among all the bottles which graced the table the general looked invain for his flask of vodka. How in the world could he dine if hedid not prepare for that important act by the rapid absorption oftwo or three little glasses of white wine, between two or threesandwiches of caviare!

"Ermolai must have left it in the wine-chest," said Matrena.

The wine-closet was in the dining-room. She rose to go there, butNatacha hurried before her down the little flight of steps, crying,"Stay there, mamma. I will go."

"Don't you bother, either. I know where it is," cried Rouletabille,and hurried after Natacha.

She did not stop. The two young people arrived in the dining-room atthe same time. They were there alone, as Rouletabille had foreseen.He stopped Natacha and planted himself in front of her.

"Why, mademoiselle, did you not answer me earlier?"

"Because I don't wish to have any conversation with you."

"If that was so, you would not have come here, where you were sureI would follow."

She hesitated, with an emotion that would have been incomprehensibleto all others perhaps, but was not to Rouletabille.

"Well, yes, I wished to say this to you: Don't write to me any more.Don't speak to me. Don't see me. Go away from here, monsieur; goaway. They will have your life. And if you have found out anything,forget it. Ah, on the head of your mother, forget it, or you arelost. That is what I wished to tell you. And now, you go."

She grasped his hand in a quick sympathetic movement that she seemedinstantly to regret.

"You go away," she repeated.

Rouletabille still held his place before her. She turned from him;she did not wish to hear anything further.

"Dear man! Poor man! Dear brave man!" She did not know what tosay. Her emotion checked all utterance. But it was necessary forher to enable him to understand that there was nothing he could doto help her in her sad straits.

"No. If they knew what you have just said, what you have proposednow, you would be dead to-morrow. Don't let them suspect. Andabove all, don't try to see me anywhere. Go back to papa at once.We have been here too long. What if they learn of it? - and theylearn everything! They are everywhere, and have ears everywhere."

"Mademoiselle, just one word more, a single word. Do you doubt nowthat Michael tried to poison your father?"

"Ah, I wish to believe it. I wish to. I wish to believe it foryour sake, my poor boy."

Rouletabille desired something besides "I wish to believe it foryour sake, my poor boy." He was far from being satisfied. She sawhim turn pale. She tried to reassure him while her trembling handsraised the lid of the wine-chest.

"What makes me think you are right is that I have decided myselfthat only one and the same person, as you said, climbed to thewindow of the little balcony. Yes, no one can doubt that, and youhave reasoned well."

But he persisted still.

"And yet, in spite of that, you are not entirely sure, since yousay, 'I wish to believe it, my poor boy.'"

"Monsieur Rouletabille, someone might have tried to poison my father,and not have come by way of the window."

"No, that is impossible."

"Nothing is impossible to them."

And she turned her head away again.

"Why, why," she said, with her voice entirely changed and quiteindifferent, as if she wished to be merely 'the daughter of thehouse' in conversation with the young man, "the vodka is not inthe wine chest, after all. What has Ermolai done with it, then?"

She ran over to the buffet and found the flask.

"Oh, here it is. Papa shan't be without it, after all."

Rouletabille was already into the garden again.

"If that is the only doubt she has," he said to himself, "I canreassure her. No one could come, excepting by the window. Andonly one came that way."

The young girl had rejoined him, bringing the flask. They crossedthe garden together to the general, who was whiling away the timeas he waited for his vodka explaining to Matrena Petrovna the natureof "the constitution." He had spilt a box of matches on the tableand arranged them carefully.

"Here," he cried to Natacha and Rouletabille. "Come here and I willexplain to you as well what this Constitution amounts to."

The young people leaned over his demonstration curiously and alleyes in the kiosk were intent on the matches.

"You see that match," said Feodor Feodorovitch. "It is the Emperor.And this other match is the Empress; this one is the Tsarevitch;and that one is the Grand-duke Alexander; and these are the othergranddukes. Now, here are the ministers and there the principalgovernors, and then the generals; these here are the bishops."

The whole box of matches was used up, and each match was in itsplace, as is the way in an empire where proper etiquette prevailsin government and the social order.

"Well," continued the general, "do you want to know, MatrenaPetrovna, what a constitution is? There! That is the Constitution."

The general, with a swoop of his hand, mixed all the matches.Rouletabille laughed, but the good Matrena said:

"I don't understand, Feodor."

"Find the Emperor now."

Then Matrena understood. She laughed heartily, she laughedviolently, and Natacha laughed also. Delighted with his success,Feodor Feodorovitch took up one of the little glasses that Natachahad filled with the vodka she brought.

"Listen, my children," said he. "We are going to commence thezakouskis. Koupriane ought to have been here before this."

Saying this, holding still the little glass in his hand, he felt inhis pocket with the other for his watch, and drew out a magnificentlarge watch whose ticking was easily heard.

"Ah, the watch has come back from the repairer," Rouletabilleremarked smilingly to Matrena Petrovna. "It looks like a splendidone."

"It has very fine works," said the general. "It was bequeathed tome by my grandfather. It marks the seconds, and the phases of themoon, and sounds the hours and half-hours."

Rouletabille bent over the watch, admiring it.

"You expect M. Koupriane for dinner?" inquired the young man, stillexamining the watch.

"Yes, but since he is so late, we'll not delay any longer. Yourhealths, my children," said the general as Rouletabille handed himback the watch and he put it in his pocket.

Rouletabille and Natacha only touched their lips to the vodka, butFeodor Feodorovitch and Matrena drank theirs in the Russian fashion,head back and all at a draught, draining it to the bottom andflinging the contents to the back of the throat. They had no morethan performed this gesture when the general uttered an oath andtried to expel what he had drained so heartily. Matrena Petrovnaspat violently also, looking with horror at her husband.

"What is it? What has someone put in the vodka?" cried Feodor.

"What has someone put in the vodka?" repeated Matrena Petrovna ina thick voice, her eyes almost starting from her head.

The two young people threw themselves upon the unfortunates.Feodor's face had an expression of atrocious suffering.

"We are poisoned," cried the general, in the midst of his chokings."I am burning inside."

Almost mad, Natacha took her father's head in her hands. She criedto him:

"Vomit, papa; vomit!"

"We must find an emetic," cried Rauletabille, holding on to thegeneral, who had almost slipped from his arms.

Matrena Petrovna, whose gagging noises were violent, hurried downthe steps of the kiosk, crossed the garden as though wild-fire were